Personalized Approach to Nutrition of Children Athletes: Practical Recommendations

Abstract

Adequate nutrition is the most important factor of children’s health, affecting not only his/her state of health, but also physical activity indicators. Children athletes, for compensating the energy cost, anabolic processes activation, and operability recovery, need an optimum diet with adequate protein, fats, carbohydrates, minerals and vitamins to cover the development and growth needs, as well as to recover from the physical and neuro-psychological stress. There are also certain requirements to food and drinking regime, especially during periods of intense training and competitions. Recommendations for the composition of diets for children athletes are developed and presented in a number of guidelines; however, studies show that the actual nutrition of almost half of the specialized children and youth Olympic reserve schools’ students does not meet the recommended standards. The article presents an overview of modern approaches to young athletes’ nutrition organization, and gives recommendations for personified diet correction and nutritive support depending on sports specialization, nature of physical activity, stage of training process, and individual features of a child.

Keywords

• nutritive support
• children athletes
• basic ration
• diet